Install Davinci Resolve on Debian with NVIDIA, a complete guide.

Davinci Resolve 19 on Debian 12 Bookworm (Linux) requires at least version 550 of the NVIDIA Drivers in order to work properly. Out of the box though Debian 12 will have Nouveau VGA drivers or if you’ve used the Debian repositories then you may be on at least version 535. If you’re planning on installing Debian 12 then I’d recommend my full Debian 12 Linux install guide, which will get you to a point where you can then install Davinci Resolve Studio. Davinci Resolve (Studio) will install even if you don’t have the right NVIDIA drivers and so you can run it with the 535 drivers, but you will soon encounter the NVIDIA Driver issue for yourself:

Davinci resolve in edit window locks up after about 10s of playback of HD footage.

How to Know Which Version of the NVIDIA Driver Your System Needs

So we need to update the NVIDIA graphics Driver to the proprietary one provided by NVidia [1] [2] but we also need to make sure ffmpeg is installed too. So that we can download the correct proprietary NVidia driver, we need to correctly identify our graphics card. So the first step is to jump onto a terminal (Konsole) and do the following:

$ sudo apt update
$ sudo apt install ffmpeg nvidia-detect
$ nvidia-detect 
Detected NVIDIA GPUs:
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: NVIDIA Corporation AD103 [GeForce RTX 4080] [10de:2704] (rev a1)

Checking card:  NVIDIA Corporation AD103 [GeForce RTX 4080] (rev a1)
Your card is supported by the default drivers.
It is recommended to install the
    nvidia-driver
package.

The nvidia-detect program belongs to the Debian repo and so it is recommending the Debian NVidia drivers. But these are already installed and are version 535. So ignore that recommendation, all we wanted to know was the graphics card model.

Downloading the Proprietary NVIDIA Driver

Go to the NVidia website downloads section and type in your card’s model along with “Linux” then find the appropriate one for your architecture (64 bit etc.) and click on it.

You’ll be presented with a form. Make the appropriate selections (language etc). and then click the button to view the driver.
You’ll be shown a page, like the one below. Click the download button and save the driver to ~/Downloads

Now that you’ve downloaded the driver, jump on over to a terminal.

BEFORE CONTINUING: If you have secure boot enabled then you will need to sign the new drivers with your MOK key for DKMS. You’ll need to know the path to the private and public parts of your MOK key pair. Wondering about the origin of these keys? Review the Debian Install Tutorial MOK Keys part before proceeding.

$ ls -al ~/Downloads/NVIDIA*
-rw-r--r-- 1 bob bob 375774798 Mar 26 22:34 /home/bob/Downloads/NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-570.133.07.run

## Install dependencies 
$ su - 
# apt -y install linux-headers-$(uname -r) build-essential libglvnd-dev pkg-config

## Disable the Nouveau drivers (if not already done so? 
# ls -1 /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist-nvidia-nouveau.conf
ls: cannot access '/etc/modprobe.d/blacklist-nvidia-nouveau.conf': No such file or directory

## If file not found then (although you could skip the test and just do this!) 
# echo blacklist nouveau > /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist-nvidia-nouveau.conf
# update-initramfs -u

Rebooting into Multi-User (Non-Graphical) Mode

OK so now we’re going to reboot into non-graphical mode, disabling the GUI and entering multi-user runlevel. We need to do this because we’re going to remove the graphics drivers so there can’t be any graphics.

# systemctl set-default multi-user.target
# systemctl reboot
## You'll get a load of text and a message saying the system will reboot. Wait 1 min...

The system will reboot itself
In the Grub loader choose Debian as usual.
Unlock your disk if it is LUKS encrypted.
At the text based login prompt log in as root
Run the following commands

Run the NVIDIA Command Line Installer

# cd /home/bob/Downloads
# ls -1 NVIDIA*
## Obviously change bob above and the correct file name below
# bash NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-570.133.07.run

You’ll now enter the NVIDIA Software Installer for Uniz/Linux. A text based interface and it will most likely fail… So I recommend you give this a go, but be prepared to cancel the install. It helps to go through this process so you understand your systems setup. Once it fails we’re going to go through how to remove the old nvidia-driver 535 so that we can restart the install safely.

Multiple kernal module types are available for this system. Which would you like to use?
[NVIDIA Proprietary]
Warning: An NVIDIA Kernel module ‘nvidia-modeset’ appears….
[OK]
Would you like to continue installation and skip sanity checks?…
[Abort installation]

# systemctl status nvidia-persistenced 
active

Although we’re in non-graphical mode there are still NVidia services running! We’re going to be replacing the NVidia 535 drivers so one option is to simply uninstall them and stop the running services.

# apt remove nvidia-*
# systemctl stop nvidia-persistenced.service

## Now we can re-run the installer for the proprietary drivers:
# bash NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-570.133.07.run

Multiple kernal module types are available for this system. Which would you like to use?
[NVIDIA Proprietary]
Building kernel modules…
Would you like to sign the NVIDIA kernel module?
[Sign the kernel module]
Use an existing key pair?
[Use existing]
Please provide the path to the private key: /var/lib/dkms/mok.key
Please provide the path to the public key: /var/lib/dkms/mok.pub
Unable to instal 32-bit compatibility libraries…
[OK]
Would you like to register the kernel module sorces with DKMS?
[Yes]
Would you like to rebuild the initramfs?
[Rebuild initramfs]
Would you like to run the nvidia-xconfig utility?
[Yes]

OK So we’re almost out of the woods and back into GUI land. We now need to tell the machine to boot into graphical mode.

# systemctl set-default graphical.target
# systemctl reboot

You may find that when you try and log in on the sddm greeting page, you can’t and you just keep on ending up on the login page. This is because modeset isn’t configured yet for the new NVIDIA drivers.

Hold down CTRL + ALT + F2 and jump into tty terminal mode. Login as root and type the following:

# cat /sys/module/nvidia_drm/parameters/modeset
N

If it returns ‘N‘ as shown then you need to do a little more configuration.

/** If the above line returned 'N' do the following two lines: */
# echo "options nvidia-drm modeset=1" >> /etc/modprobe.d/nvidia-options.conf
# reboot

After rebooting, repeat the test above from tty2 (cat /sys/mod……..modeset etc) and see if it now returns ‘Y’? You should now be able to log in and access the Desktop Environment! Now just open a terminal and check the NVIDIA driver version.

$ nvidia-smi --version
NVIDIA-SMI version  : 570.133.07
DRIVER version      : 570.133.07
CUDA Version        : 12.8

Install Davinci Resolve (Studio) Finally

There’s two versions of Davinci Resolve:

Davinci Resolve – the free version
Davinci Resolve Studio – the paid version

But what I share here should work for whatever version you’re installing, just be sure to adapt my instructions to suit your needs. Either way the journey begins on the black magic design website.

Register and/or Log into the blackmagicdesign.com website
Visit https://apps.cloud.blackmagicdesign.com/davinci-resolve
Scroll to the bottom and hit the “Download Linux” button. Download of about 2.8GB will begin.
Once it has downloaded open the Downloads folder and right click on the Davinci_Resolve_19.1.4_Linux.zip file and open it with your preferred archive manager, eg. Ark

Extract the contents to the Downloads folder:

As you can see there are clear instructions so simply follow them…
Hint, if you double click on the Davinci…..run file in the GUI file viewer you may get a little pop-up asking what to do:

You want to Execute the script.
It will prompt you for your password after you’ve done the accepting terms part:

At 99% complete it’s going to ask you to authenticate again so don’t go anywhere…

Hit the Complete / Finish button when installation is done and you’re good to go! (almost)
Launch Davinci Resolve in one of two ways:
- On the Desktop you’ll find an icon.
- Hit the launcher key (usually looks like mac or windows symbol between CTRL and ALT on left hand side) and type “Davinci” and it will show you the Davinci Resolve launcher icon in the list.

Hit “Continue” and then it will prompt you for a “Quick Setup”

You can just skip this but I’ll walk us through the Quick Setup process.
It’s going to run an OS and graphics card test. What you’ll see is the icons in the window below flashing rapidly, as if there is a glitch… that’s the test:

Next you’re asked what size project you want. Choose whatever, you can change it anytime.

Now decide where you want your media to reside:

ISSUE! If you are using a dark desktop theme (Like mine) then you may come a bit unstuck at this point because the window that pops up is terrible and hard to see:

Here’s my rendition of it so you can make stuff out a bit easier:

Changing your Global Theme Appearance under system settings to a light theme does not change how badly rendered this window is. I hope Davinci Resolve resolves this issue ASAP.

Your best bet is to either:

create the folder you want to use in the system’s file manager GUI and then try to get to it from the above Davinci window, hitting “Choose” when you’ve got to it.
Just accept the defaults and then once you are in Davinci Resolve go to the top menu: Davinci Resolve > Preferences… > Media Storage
- Remove the default one
- Add the directory path you want.

Things to Do Once Davinci Resolve is Installed

Go to the top menu: Davinci Resolve > Preferences… > Memory and GPU
- Make sure GPU Configuration is set to use your NVIDIA Graphics card (or other discrete PEG graphics card)
- Make sure the GPU processing mode is set to CUDA
Go to the top menu: Davinci Resolve > Preferences… > Internet Accounts
- If you have an account you may wish to sign in here. I didn’t.
Save the changes and restart Davinci Resolve to implement the changes.

References

[1] Installing Proprietary NVidia Driver on Debian 12: https://linuxconfig.org/how-to-install-nvidia-driver-on-debian-12-bookworm-linux

[2] NVidia Driver 550 Issues: https://forums.developer.nvidia.com/t/debian-12-kde-nvidia-driver-550-after-install-nvidia-drivers-hybrid-mode-stop-working-my-bad-or-nvidia-bug/286516

Installing Davinci Resolve 19 on Debian 12 “Bookworm” with an NVidia Graphics Card